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What say you. Is it a good treaty for all concerned including our host and his country. How

does or will it effect all (11) countries involved. Either it is going to help or hurt the different

countries in terms of employment, their economy and the overall balance of power

in the pacific rim. What say you!

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There's a lot involved. On the whole it favours the big players doesn't it? Here's some more information below:

The Trans-Pacific Partnership is great for elites. Is it good for anyone else?

In 2011, Australia enacted a tough new anti-smoking law that requires cigarette companies to distribute their wares in plain green packages. Anti-smoking activists see Australia's law as a model for the world. They hope that replacing logos with graphic health warnings will make them less appealing to consumers, especially minors.

Naturally, tobacco companies hated the law. And they found a surprising way to fight back: they persuaded governments in Ukraine and Honduras to file complaints with the World Trade Organization, alleging that the new regulations violated global trade rules.

The case is ongoing, and we don't know how the WTO will rule. But this dispute comes up over and over again in debates about the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a massive new trade deal that is expected to be completed in the next few months. The Obama administration says the deal will expand global trade and bolster America's leadership in Asia. But critics say the treaty will lead to a lot more disputes like the one in Australia, where powerful interest groups try to use trade rules to overrule democratically elected governments.

The TPP covers a bewildering range of topics. In addition to conventional trade issues like tariff rates, it includes language on labor rights, environmental laws, copyright and patent protections, e-commerce, state-owned enterprises, corruption, and government procurement.

Trade deals like the TPP have grown so complex because the global trade community has figured out how to solve a problem that has bedeviled philosophers and political leaders for centuries: how to craft international agreements with teeth. The WTO's dispute-settlement process, which serves as a model for the TPP, puts pressure on countries to actually keep the promises they make in trade deals. That's why everyone with an agenda — wealthy investors, drug companies, labor unions, environmental groups, and so on — is scrambling to get on the bandwagon.

But the complex, secretive, and anti-democratic way the TPP is being crafted rubs a lot of people the wrong way. The agreement will have profound and long-lasting effects on countries that sign on, yet voters in those countries won't even be allowed to see the text until negotiations are over and it's too late to make changes. No wonder so many groups — the AFL-CIO, civil liberties groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and even the free traders at the Cato Institute — have been raising concerns about it.

Read more here:

http://www.vox.com/2015/4/17/8438995/why-obamas-new-trade-deal-is-so-controversial

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